Of Poems, and Prayers, and Promises
by DianaM -again
Summary: Duty, Family, Friendship.
1. Chapter 1: Intro

He stared at the picture on his office wall. A shot Mamma had taken of the yard and outbuildings, the sun tickling the rolling hills of the west pasture. If he stood up and got close, he'd be able to make out a small strip of the woods.

"Duke?"

He'd ridden from those buildings over the pasture and through that woods to the river beyond. Ridden and run, strolled and driven. Often with a gaggle of cousins and friends in tow. In the summer, the riverbanks were cool under the shade of the oaks, sycamores and maples. Years of screwing around on the banks, from pirate battles to picnics with a few beers snuck into the cooler when Mamma and Jack weren't looking.

"Duke?"

Last time he was home, he'd taken the girls and met up with Willy and his family. Cold fried chicken and chickenfights in the shallows. Just through the woods.

"Duke, are you OK?"

Duke grunted so she'd stop asking. He didn't shift his gaze, although he knew it was rude to not look any of them in the eye. It was how he'd been raised; you look at someone when you're talking to them. Mamma brought him up with solid manners. All his aunts and Uncles had done the same for each and every one of them. _We may not be rich, we may not be fancy…two things we have for sure- family and manners._

But no amount of good manners could make him meet her eye, or match the gaze of any of the soldiers in his office.

"Duke, what was that call? Is everything all right?"

Inadvertently, he looked down at his phone on the desktop. Simple. The new-fangled thing with a field of buttons was on his aide's desk. He'd tried it on his own, and hated being bothered with more than a call at a time. One time, he'd tried dialing out to Flint, only to be interrupted by an empty line. Every time he tried to call out, the same empty call interrupted. It was maddening, and he was all set to go out and grab Clutch by the collar when Thompson stuck his head in to ask why he was calling himself on his second line.

Duke hadn't even known he had two lines. He didn't want two lines. Thompson took over and engaged in telephone triage, funneling calls to him in the right order, neatly trimming away those he didn't even need to bother with and moving the most important ones to the front of the line. Like he'd done just now.

Duke stood and walked the few steps to the picture so he could get a closer look at the woods. He had to swallow a few times to find his voice. "We'll finish up after lunch, people."

He didn't expect the pause as people weighed his words. Such a simple order, he assumed it would be followed immediately and he would be left alone.

"After lunch." Still no movement. "Dismissed."

Chairs scraped against the floor and feet shuffled. He watched them file out through the door from the corner of his eye. Stalker pulled the door shut after him. The quiet click should have signaled his release, but Duke knew better. Four Joes had gone, but one had stayed behind.

 _Stubborn as a goddamn mule._

"After lunch, Scarlett. It can wait till then."

"I'm sure it can. Or even longer. What was that call? Was it Washington?"

He knew without looking that she was still sitting on his couch, and had her arms crossed over her chest. She did that when she dug in. Sat in a way that challenged anyone to try their hardest to shift her.

"Yes." He could just make out where the trees parted for the trail to slip into the woods.

"Are we going to have to ship a team out somewhere?"

"No." Duke's cousins had ambushed them once there, dropping from the branches of the big sycamore. Jeff near peed his pants, but Duke managed to wrestle all three cousins into submission before rubbing each of their noses into the mud left behind by spring storms. Boys.

"Wait…that _was_ DC, right?" He'd managed to confuse her. It didn't happen often.

"Yes. That was DC." He wished she'd go to lunch.

"What do they want us to do?"

"It wasn't for us." Duke decided to trace the rolling hills of the pasture with a finger. "It was for me." He swallowed to keep himself on track. "Scarlett, go to lunch now."

He heard her rise and gather her notes from the low table. Muscles he didn't know he'd tightened relaxed in anticipation of solitude. The heels of her boots clacked over the linoleum tiles, and he glanced sidelong at the door to watch her leave. But her hand found his back instead of the doorknob.

"Duke, what's going on?" The soft voice purred in his ear, her fingers slid from one shoulder to the other and back.

He should have pulled away. He was supposed to discourage her. Instead he traced over the roof of the barn as her fingers traced his muscles. "Personal matter, Red. No worries. I'm going to be off base for a few days. I'll tell you the details after I figure them all out."

"What happened?" She stepped around to his right, hand sliding over one shoulder and down his arm. "Let me in, huh?"

Duke found himself blinking. "Yeah, nothing for you to be concerned about. They just…" He swallowed…"anyhow, they've found what's left of my cousin near Khe Sanh." He dropped his hand, having traced over every building and hill in the frame. "He's being shipped home next week." He felt her fingers slide up to his bicep. "I want to be there when the casket gets…" He stopped.

She stood with him. It must have been over a minute, but Scarlett stood, holding onto his arm as he gathered himself.

"…I want to be there when he comes home."


	2. Chapter 2

He felt her arms come around him. He should have pulled away. But while his mind echoed regulations and rules, his body refused to take heed. He felt her head against his arm. Duke looked at the pasture trying to figure out just when the picture had been taken. Summer. Sometime in the last five years-the stable sported the new roof. He hadn't said much during the call. Answered, identified himself, listened to the DPAA man on the other end, uttered a few yeses, then taken down a date and flight number. There were arrangements yet to make. He should call his aunt. They'd called Duke first out of deference to his clearance and position, but the info would be public soon, and the DPAA would be tasked with making a call to Missouri. He wanted to get through first. Then call Mamma. All sorts of details. He noticed a small black blob huddled by the barn he hadn't seen before. He tapped the glass.

"That's Pirate. He's my sister's cat, really. Got one eye. Born that way. Keeps the rats down. Never noticed him there before."

"Duke…"

"Stupid cat hates my guts. No clue why." He snorted. "Only reason he lets me get near is to try and kill me."

Scarlett slid around in front of him, blocking his view. "Duke."

"I've tried everything. String, fish treats, whole cans of tuna, little catnip mice." He looked up at the ceiling. "Nothing works, and it's a shame, really, because, you know, I really like cats."

"When's he coming in?" Her fingers slid between his.

"Next Tuesday." He put his free hand to his face. "I bet you're hungry. Go to lunch, OK?"

She didn't push him, but she wouldn't leave, either. "They're flying him to DC?"

"LAX. I'll go meet the plane there."

Scarlett's fingers tightened. "You'll fly with him to Arlington?"

"No." He had to stop to let what was threatening die down enough for him to continue safely.

"Surely he's earned the right, Duke." Her free hand slid up his arm again.

Duke sucked in a deep breath through his fingers. "Yes. No. It's not what he wanted." He took a second breath. "All his letters. To me and to his parents. To everyone…he wanted to be home. He made me promise…and his mother."

"You promised?"

"We wrote each other, you know. Wolfe and me. We wrote the whole time. He stuck it out, but he hated it. All he ever wanted was to go home. Every letter, he'd tell me how much he just wanted to be back there. We wrote until…until his letters stopped." He dropped his hand and looked her right in the eye. "I promised him that if anything happened, I'd help him get home."

She said nothing. Her eyes held his as she patiently waited for him to continue.

"So, I have to get him there." He grasped at composure. Burying himself in the details helped. "Meet the plane at LAX, get him on another back to St Louis, and get him back to Musick's Ferry. But I have to call and make sure things are ready for when he gets there. Find a place for the vigil, things like that. I gotta get to his mother before she gets the official call…" He broke the gaze to look back over his shoulder at his desk. "I have to get on this, Red. She's going to need me. They all need me to—"

He made to step back and get to his desk, but she grabbed his arm. Before he knew what was happening, she had wrapped him up, standing on her toes, one hand reaching around his neck to gently pull his head down to her shoulder. Her other arm held him tightly. He resisted for a second, but then something flipped in his head, and Duke let go and allowed himself to sink into the warmth enveloping him. He relaxed into her embrace, wrapping his own arms around her and inhaling the smell of her shampoo. He took several gulps of it.

"Duke, you can handle everything for everyone else in a little bit. It can wait , just a little bit." Her fingers were in his hair. He couldn't remember the last time someone had bothered touching him gently.

"…Ok." His voice was muffled in her shoulder. If Thompson was wondering what had been going on, he certainly wasn't making any noise about it. Usually by now he'd be checking in before leaving on his lunch break. It was possible he joined the others on their way to the commissary. He must have noticed Scarlett hadn't left with the rest of them. Duke wondered about what the topic of their conversation could be. "Don't you want lunch?"

"That can wait, too." She continued to run her fingers over his scalp.

"…Ok." He tried to not think of anything beyond her fingers, and voice, and what it felt to relax into another person who was only there because he needed it. It was better than all the things he _should_ have been thinking. Submitting a formal request for the leave. Funeral plans and flights, responsibilities and frat regs. Phone calls and rules and flags folded into triangles to be handed to the next of kin with thanks. White gloves and rifle volleys. Duke should really pull himself up, gently push her back, and get on with it.

But he didn't want to. Not just yet. Right now, all he wanted was a few minutes to think of nothing but how her fingers felt in his hair and how she had found a way to make him feel he could let everything down without risking himself. Because she'd sensed from the beginning that he'd be needing her. Because she knew how to be there when he couldn't bring himself to tell anyone he could just really use…

"Thanks, Scarlett." He lifted his head just enough to switch cheeks against her shoulder.

"No problem. The look on your face when you got that call told me you'd need a hug from a friend." Her fingers scratched at his neck. "Wanna go sit on that couch? I can tell you from experience, its pretty comfy."

 _That_ would be pushing it. Duke could justify comfort. He'd even sat people on the couch and sat next to them when they needed his empathy. But he couldn't very well put himself there in her embrace. He _wanted_ to, in more ways than he could let on. But it was definitely over the line. He was her superior, it was wrong, and at the back of his head, he knew once he'd let it go there he would reach a point of no return. Duke already had enough on his plate, he didn't need to take that on as well.

He pulled himself together and pulled himself up, hands on her shoulders. "Red, thanks. I needed that. But I really do have to get moving on this. I have to call _Tante_ Nina before the DPAA gets to her. It's better coming from me. Then I can call Mamma so she can help her. We've got to figure out exactly where to take him." It wasn't all that hard, there was only one funeral parlor in town.

The look in her eyes spoke of things they were eventually going to have to discuss. But she could wait. "You're right, of course. Look, how about I go and grab us both a sandwich or something, and bring it back here? You mind me hanging out?"

His first inclination was to say yes, he did mind. Duke found with a little shock that he didn't. He'd be OK with her there. There was nothing he was about to do that needed to be kept from her. Sharpe or Hawk would say otherwise. But neither man was there. He managed a smile, and saw her reflect it back at him. "Nah, you can keep me company. Especially if you've got lunch."

She laughed. "Great, I'll go grab you some grub." She opened his office door revealing that Thompson had, indeed, gone on break.

"Scarlett?"

She paused, glancing back over her shoulder with a raised brow.

"Thanks."

"Hey, what are friends for?"


End file.
